Gummi Bear Osmosis

Gummy Bear Project

I was trying to find which gummy bear absorbed the most in each liquid. Before I started my experiments for my project I thought the Haribo gummy bears will become the heaviest in the Vinegar because the Vinegar is an acid and the gummy bear could expand more in an acid more than a base and a neutral liquid. I chose this topic because last year I tried doing the experiment with a regular gummy bear and saw if it grew ,and it did. This could be a chance to do the experiment again but put more work into it with different graphs and charts and more data with different variables.

First, when I started the experiment I used a clear glass to examine the gummy bear while it was in the liquid. I used three different kinds of gummy bears (Haribo, Blackforest, Jelly Belly). I also used three different liquids (Water, Vinegar, Baking Soda Water Mix). The liquids are all different because I wanted to know the effect on different kinds of liquids. The water is a neutral, vinegar is a acid, and the baking soda water mix is a base. I dropped the gummy bear in the water at 9:00 at night and took the gummy bear out at 7:00 in the morning. It was in the liquid for ten hours to absorb the liquid. Before you put the gummy bear in the liquid make sure to measure the volume before putting it in the liquid so you can find out how much it grew. When I took the gummy bear out of the liquid we measured the volume of it (Length x Width x Height), to see how much it grew. After each experiment we subtracted the volume from the beginning from the volume after being tested, so we can find how much it grew in all.

Secondly, the Haribo gummy bears volume became 7cm bigger in water and in the vinegar and baking soda the Haribo gummy bears volume was 1.75cm bigger after the experiment. My second gummy bear brand (Jelly Belly) was tested in the water and it became 4 cm bigger than it was before. The gummy bear in the vinegar and the baking soda water mix became only 1cm bigger. Lastly, the Black Forest gummy bear became 4 cm bigger in the water and the vinegar. It only grew 1cm in the baking soda water mix.

In conclusion the found out that the Haribo gummy bear became the biggest in the water. I learned that when there is a gummy you can make it expand in a liquid for a certain amount of time. My hypothesis was not correct, I thought that the HAribo gummy bear was going to be the biggest in the vinegar, and it was not. I think that my experiment was accurate because the data was good and that there was no problem with the experiment. I could improve the experiment by maybe adding more variables and liquids to the project.